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Sex Education Resources

Here you can find relevant research as well as tools, templates and sample documents for each phase of the toolkit.  

Displaying 36 resources

Addressing Sexual Health in Schools: Policy Considerations

This resource provides an overview of key policy components for sexual health education in schools. It includes sample policies and other resources pertaining to parental notification and involvement, curriculum selection and materials review, professional development, the role of external agencies and more.  

Best Practices for Family Engagement

Best Practices for Family Engagement provides tips on how to engage parents and guardians before, during and after sex education implementation.  

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Brochure for School District Engagement

Eyes Open Iowa created a high-level brochure to introduce school districts to the project, purpose, student need, and resources available which can help clarify the CSE opportunity and pathway to success.  

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Capacity Assessment and Planning Tool (CAPT)

The Capacity Assessment and Planning Tool (CAPT) aids in determining how ready a school district is to engage in sex education efforts.  This can be adapted to respond to a specific state or regional context. 

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Common Core Standards for English Language and Mathematics

Because the majority of states have voluntarily adopted the Common Core Standards for mathematics and English language arts/literacy (ELA), some WISE grantee partners have aligned their sexuality curriculum with the ELA components.  

Comprehensive Sex Education and Academic Success: Effective Programs Foster Student Achievement

This fact sheet provides a summary of recent research highlighting the connections between sex education and academic success.  

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Curriculum Selection Tool

This curriculum selection tool lists a variety of criteria to consider including curriculum, training and TA availability and cost, alignment with standards and best practices, etc.  

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Division of Adolescent and School Health  (DASH)

DASH supports 19 state and 17 local education agencies to support schools and school districts in implementing exemplary sexual health education, increase adolescent access to sexual health services and establish safe and supportive environments for students and staff.

Florida's Sexual Health Education Community Outreach Toolkit

This Tool Kit was created to provide valuable information, innovative ideas, and strategies for community members to build awareness and support for policies and programs that improve sexual health outcomes among youth.

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Georgia State and Regional Sex Education Policy Overview

School districts and teachers may not be aware of current sex education policies and education codes that govern sex education. Creating a simple, accessible handout with the key policies and codes can ensure stakeholders understand what is mandated and where opportunities for tailoring to local contexts exist. GCAPP created a state-level overview and regional fact sheets to allow regions to compare their policies with the state policy.

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Health Education Curriculum Analysis Tool

The Health Education Curriculum Analysis Tool (HECAT) can help school districts, schools, and others conduct a clear, complete, and consistent analysis of health education curricula based on the National Health Education Standards and CDC’s Characteristics of Effective Health Education Curricula.

How Schools Work and How to Work with Schools

This publication, produced by the National Association of State Boards of Education (NASBE), provides a summary of the federal, state and local educational systems of governance, outlines key tips for engaging and partnering with schools and answers frequently asked questions about education.  

Making Adaptations to Evidence-Based Pregnancy and STD/HIV Prevention Programs

By 
ETR

ETR offers adaptation kits which contain practical tools and resources to guide adolescent reproductive health practitioners in making effective adaptations and maintaining fidelity to program core components. The adaptation kits were developed to provide clarity on how each program was designed, its core components, and the types of adaptations that are considered safe and those that should be avoided.

Memorandum of Understanding

This memorandum of understanding template outlines potential roles and responsibilities of the partners involved in sex education implementation efforts. Not only does an MOU clarify expectations, but also helps to institutionalize efforts so that agreements can continue even if a key stakeholder changes positions.

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National Health Education Standards

The National Health Education Standards provide a framework to help teachers, administrators, and policymakers promote health-enhancing behaviors among students in grade levels Pre-K through 12. The framework, consisting of eight health education standards, includes performance indicators that can be applied to a variety of health topics.

National Sexuality Education Standards Curricula Mapping Tools

By mapping state or local standards and/or programs and curricula to the National Sexuality Education Standards, school professionals can identify which topics are currently covered in sex education class by grade level and which are not. 

National Sexuality Education Standards, Second Edition (2020)

The goal of the National Sex Education Standards: Core Content and Skills, K–12 (Second Edition) is
to provide clear, consistent, and straightforward guidance on the essential, minimum, core content and skills needed for sex education that is age-appropriate for students in grades K–12 to be effective. The National Sexuality Education Standards were developed and align to the National Health Education Standards.

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North Carolina Parent Opinion Survey of Public School Sexuality Education

SHIFT NC created a report to document the findings from their parent survey. They used the positive reactions from parents about inclusion of sex education in schools to substantiate their efforts and allay school district leadership fears.

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Preliminary Assessment

By 

Based on a similar tool developed by SHIFT NC, this preliminary assessment provides an early gauge of whether or not a school district shows promise. 

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Sample School District Stakeholder Message Development

Georgia Campaign for Adolescent Power & Potential (GCAPP), a WISE lead partner, developed a simple tool to document the various needs of key constituency groups. This sample shows the different school district stakeholders they engaged and how they tailored their message to distinct stakeholder needs. GCAPP staff would reference this document before conversations with these key stakeholders to ensure they were connecting their efforts to each stakeholder’s needs during every interaction.

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Sample Table Showing Curriculum Mapped to Education Code

By 
ETR

ETR Associates mapped two curricula -- Making Healthy Choices and Positive Prevention  -- to mandated HIV and CSE education codes to determine alignment between curricula and policy. This table provides an example of what mapping and alignment looks like in practice.

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School Health Advisory Council

This sample presentation discusses the role and function of School Health Advisory Councils (SHACs) as well as tips for successful recruitment and retention of SHAC members.

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School Health Profiles

The School Health Profiles are a system of surveys assessing school health policies and practices in states, large urban school districts, territories, and tribal governments. Profiles are conducted biennially by education and health agencies among middle and high school principals and lead health education teachers.

Sex and HIV Education Programs For Youth: Their Impact and Important Characteristics

By 
ETR

This research summarizes sex and HIV education programs and hones in on 17 characteristics of programs that led to behavior change.

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State Policies in Brief, Sex and HIV Education

The Guttmacher Institute’s State Policies in Brief provide state-by-state information on key issues affecting sexual and reproductive health and rights. The publications are updated monthly to reflect the most recent legislative, administrative, and judicial actions. The Sex and HIV Education brief summarizes state-level sex and HIV education policies, as well as specific content requirements, based on a review of state laws, regulations and other legally binding policies

State Profiles

SIECUS State Profiles is a state-by-state resource that describes sexuality education and abstinence-only-until-marriage programs in each state.  Each state profile includes a summary of state laws and policies related to sexuality education.  It also includes information about a variety of federal funding programs that support sexuality education and/or abstinence-only-until-marriage programs as well as how much money each state is receiving from each federal program (if applicable) and a summary of how it is being used. 

State School Health Policy Database

The NASBE State School Health Policy Database contains brief descriptions of laws, legal codes, rules, regulations, administrative orders, mandates, standards, resolutions, and other written means of exercising authority. It also includes guidance documents and other non-binding materials that provide a more detailed picture of a state’s school health policies and activities. Hyperlinks to full written policies are provided whenever possible. The database is searchable by state, topic, and keyword.

Tool to Assess the Characteristics of Effective Sex and STD/HIV Programs

By 
ETR

Based on the Sex and HIV Education Programs for Youth: Their Impact and Important Characteristics research, this tool is designed to assess, select, improve, or design a sex or STD/HIV education program.

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WISE Toolkit

This PDF of the WISE Toolkit includes content related to the each of the four phases and corresponding steps.  

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Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System (YRBSS)

The YRBSS monitors six priority health-risk behaviors among youth and young adults including sexual behaviors that contribute to unintended pregnancy and STDs/HIV, alcohol and other drug use as well as violence. Annual and trend data is available.